Day 20 of the Fast Metabolism Diet: In Hummus, We Trust

Hey, did you guys know that normal grocery stores don’t carry sprouted grain bread and other gluten-free products? It was a rude awakening for me. (Celiacs, I hear you gritting your teeth.)

Yesterday, I arrived in sunny old Westwood, Mass. on the Amtrak, only three minutes late, to be greeted by my father, who immediately suggested we go to the grocery store to stock up on diet-safe foods. This is a a sacrifice not to be underestimated: I am a nightmare in a grocery store, partly because I’m used to ordering groceries and having them delivered, and partly because my head doesn’t work right. I become totally ADHD, unable to concentrate on the aisle I’m in or the food I’m looking at. Or I do the opposite, and concentrate too much.

“Berries,” I intone to myself. “Beeerrries. Now which ones are low-glycemic, again?”

People understandably start shuffling away from me nervously. Not a lot of ladies talking to themselves in the Roche Bros. in Needham, Massachusetts, and the ones that are have been drinking since they got up.

Now, I don’t mean to insinuate anything bad about suburban grocery stores. In general, they are a palace of fresh produce, especially compared to city grocery stores, which generally look like someone took all the apples and bowled them down an alley for funsies. But unless you go to Whole Foods or Trader Joe’s, you’re not going to find a lot of specialty food items in a suburban grocery store. There’s very little organic produce, the “ethnic” food section is likely to comprise one can of Goya beans, and if you’re a celiac, well, you can go fuck yourself. There’s gluten in everything. I’m pretty sure the flowers in the florist section up front are sprayed with wheat.

All this to say that I just had a plate of hummus, vegetables, turkey, and blackberries for breakfast. It was oddly delicious, if not totally breakfast-y. Today, at some point, I’ll hit the Whole Foods and look for sprouted grain or, failing that, rice bread. Which is usually a compromise best left unmade, but I am desperate for some bread.